Questions to Ask an Intern
Questions for a manager or mentor during an internship rather than in the interview: weekly check-ins, a midpoint review, and the last conversation before the intern leaves.
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The questions
Each question, and why to ask it
What are you working on this week, and how is it going?
Why ask it
The plainest opener, and it establishes that check-ins are about the work rather than an assessment. Note whether they describe tasks or outcomes, since interns often do not know which one you want.
What has taken longer than you expected?
Why ask it
Interns rarely volunteer that something is slow because they assume the delay is their fault. This phrasing makes the delay the subject rather than their competence.
What are you waiting on from someone else?
Why ask it
Blocked work is the most common way an internship quietly loses a week. Juniors will wait days for an answer that you can get in one message, and they will not ask you to.
Is anything unclear about what you are supposed to be doing?
Why ask it
Ask it early and repeatedly, because instructions that seemed obvious to you often assumed context they do not have. Silence in week one usually means they are guessing politely.
What have you had to guess at because you did not want to interrupt anyone?
Why ask it
The most useful question on this list. It gives permission to admit guessing, and the answers frequently reveal an undocumented process everyone else learned by being told.
Who have you met so far, and who should you meet next?
Why ask it
Interns default to the two people nearest their desk. Mapping it out loud lets you introduce them deliberately rather than hoping the network happens on its own.
What do you want to be able to do by the time you leave?
Why ask it
Worth asking again a few weeks in, because the answer often changes once they see the real work. Comparing it to what they said in the interview tells you what to adjust.
Which part of the work do you want more of?
Why ask it
Cheap to act on and rarely offered unprompted. If you can shift even a few hours a week toward it, engagement usually rises noticeably.
Which part would you happily never do again?
Why ask it
You may not be able to remove it, but naming it prevents quiet resentment and tells you what you are asking them to absorb. If the whole role is that thing, you have a design problem.
What have you noticed about how we work that seems strange?
Why ask it
A newcomer sees your habits clearly for about three weeks and then stops noticing. Asking inside that window is the only time you get this information for free.
What would you change about your first week if we could run it again?
Why ask it
Produces concrete onboarding fixes such as missing access, an unexplained tool, or nobody at the door on day one. Write the answers down and use them for the next intern.
Is the amount of supervision right, or do you want more or less?
Why ask it
Interns almost never raise this on their own, in either direction. Offering both options makes it possible to say that daily check-ins feel like distrust, or that a week alone felt like abandonment.
Has any feedback I gave you not made sense?
Why ask it
Feedback delivered gently is often heard as approval, and feedback delivered briefly is often not understood at all. Asking directly is how you find out which happened.
Is there anything I have said that landed badly?
Why ask it
A hard question to ask and harder for them to answer honestly, so leave real silence after it. Even a small answer tells you they trust you, which is worth knowing on its own.
What are you finding hard that you assumed would be easy?
Why ask it
Names the gap between coursework and the job, which is where most intern anxiety lives. It is also where you can most usefully reassure them that the difficulty is normal.
What is taking up your time without teaching you anything?
Why ask it
Some routine work is legitimate and some is just offloading. This question keeps you honest about the ratio, which is the difference between an internship and cheap labor.
What do you want to show at the end, and who should see it?
Why ask it
Turns loose tasks into something presentable and gives you a reason to get senior people in a room. Interns care about this more than they usually say.
How is the workload sitting against your classes or other commitments?
Why ask it
Ask during exam periods especially, since students will not volunteer that they are struggling for fear of seeming uncommitted. Adjusting hours for two weeks costs you very little.
What do you want to do after this, and what would help you get there?
Why ask it
Their answer may not involve your company, which is fine and useful to know. The specific help they name, whether a reference, an introduction, or a portfolio piece, is usually easy to give.
What should I ask the next intern in their first week?
Why ask it
A closing question that treats them as someone with expertise about your program. The suggestion is often something they wished you had asked them and did not.
What do you already know how to do that we might not know about?
Why ask it
Interns often arrive with a skill nobody asked about: a language, a design tool, a summer in a warehouse. It stays hidden unless someone asks, and it is usually the fastest route to giving them real work.
What have you never done before that you will need to do here?
Why ask it
Framing it as a list to plan against rather than a weakness gets an honest answer. It also tells you which pieces of onboarding are genuinely new to them and which you can skip.
How do you prefer to get instructions: in a meeting, in writing, or by watching first?
Why ask it
The cheapest thing you can learn about a new person. Explaining verbally to someone who needs it written down produces work that is confidently wrong and takes twice as long to unpick.
How do you want to be told when something is wrong?
Why ask it
Ask in week one and correction becomes a procedure you agreed rather than a surprise. Some want the fix immediately, some want the reasoning first; guessing wrong costs you weeks of a nervous intern over-checking everything.
What hours suit you, and when should I not expect a reply?
Why ask it
Interns will otherwise mirror whatever they see, including your late messages. Setting the boundary yourself prevents the quiet assumption that evening replies are part of the job.
Is anything about the setup not working: laptop, access, desk, travel?
Why ask it
New starters assume broken access is their own fault and wait. Asking directly in the first days catches the missing permission that would otherwise cost them a week of pretending to be busy.
Is there anything you would rather not be asked to do without warning: presenting, calls, video?
Why ask it
There is a difference between stretching someone and ambushing them. Knowing in advance lets you give notice, which usually turns a refusal into a manageable challenge.
What worries you about the next few weeks?
Why ask it
Named early, the worry is usually mundane and solvable: not knowing anyone, a tool they have never used, the commute. Left unnamed, it shapes how they behave for a month.
If something here is going badly, who would you tell?
Why ask it
If the only answer is you, they have no route when the problem is you. Naming a second person, a mentor, a peer, an HR contact, in week one is what makes that route usable later.
When you get stuck, how long do you sit with it before asking?
Why ask it
Gives you the chance to name a number. Most interns overestimate the cost of asking and underestimate the cost of a lost afternoon, and an explicit threshold resolves it permanently.
What is the hardest part of asking for help here?
Why ask it
Assumes there is friction, which there almost always is: an intimidating colleague, an unanswered channel, a fear of looking slow. Naming the obstacle is usually most of the fix.
Have you had enough context to know why your tasks matter?
Why ask it
Work handed over without its purpose gets done to the letter and misses the point. If they cannot say who uses their output, they have been given instructions rather than a job.
What did you expect this job to involve that it has not?
Why ask it
Catches the mismatch between the interview pitch and the actual work while there is still time to fix it. Disappointed interns rarely raise this unprompted; they wait, then leave a poor review.
Is there something you would like to try that has not been offered?
Why ask it
Interns assume the boundaries of their role are fixed. Asking directly surfaces requests they have already decided not to make, which are often cheap for you to grant.
Is there a part of the business you are curious about that is not your job?
Why ask it
Interns rarely ask to sit in on another team's work, but often want to. An hour with sales or support is cheap for you and is regularly the thing they remember.
What would you tell a friend about this job if I were not in the room?
Why ask it
The framing acknowledges that they are unlikely to criticise you directly. Some will still soften it, but you usually get closer to the real assessment than a direct question yields.
What is one thing we could change that would make the rest of your time here better?
Why ask it
Asking for one thing rather than any thoughts makes the question answerable. Expect something practical: a recurring meeting, a piece of access, a clearer brief.
What would you want me to be able to write about you at the end?
Why ask it
Working backwards from the reference makes the whole placement concrete. It tells you which evidence they need to gather and gives you both a shared target from day one.
Running an Internship Worth Having
Practical guidance for the conversation itself
The First Week
Have the Access Ready Before They Arrive
Accounts, hardware, building entry, and a place to sit. Interns lose whole days to permissions and assume complaining about it would be rude, so nothing gets flagged until the exit conversation.
Name the Person to Ask
Tell them explicitly who to interrupt with small questions, and tell that person too. Without a named contact, interns save up questions for a weekly meeting and stay stuck in between.
Give One Real Task in Week One
Something small that actually ships or gets used. It teaches your process faster than any documentation, and it settles the question every intern is privately asking about whether the work is real.
Say What Good Looks Like
Describe what a successful ten weeks would look like in concrete terms, and what would count as falling short. Students are used to grading criteria and are unsettled without any equivalent.
Through the Middle
Hold a Midpoint Review
Halfway through, sit down and say plainly what is going well and what needs to change. Leaving corrections to the final week is how interns finish surprised, and it removes any chance for them to act on it.
Protect One Project From Interruption
Interns get pulled into whatever is urgent, and then have nothing to point at in August. Keep one piece of work theirs, with a deadline and a reviewer, whatever else comes up.
Let Them Attend Things Above Their Level
Invite them to a planning meeting or a customer call as an observer and debrief afterward. Watching how decisions get argued is the part of a workplace that cannot be taught in a task.
Correct Small Things Immediately
Habits around email, version control, or meeting behavior are easy to fix in week two and awkward in week nine. Say it once, kindly, at the time.
The Last Two Weeks
Write the Reference While It Is Fresh
Offer a written reference or a note they can keep, with specifics about what they did. Six months later, whoever supervised them will remember much less, and they will need it then.
Have Them Hand Over Properly
Ask for a short written handover of what they built, what is unfinished, and where things live. It is a real professional skill and it saves your team from work that becomes unusable when they leave.
Ask What You Got Wrong
In the final week, ask directly what was frustrating about the program. Answers get more honest once the assessment is over, and they are the only reliable way to improve next year.
Be Straight About What Comes Next
If a full-time offer is not possible, say so plainly rather than implying a maybe. If it is possible, explain the timeline and what the decision depends on.